Good economic performance makes Brazilian president more popular

[Judi Lynn]

Good economic performance makes Brazilian president more popular
2009-11-24 11:18:05

RIO DE JANEIRO, Nov. 23 (Xinhua) -- Brazil's good economic performance during the international financial crisis and its positive image abroad have boosted Brazilian President Lula's approval ratings at home.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's personal approval ratings jumped from 76.8 percent in September to 78.9 percent in November, while his disapproval ratings declined from 18.7 percent in September to 14.6 percent in November, according to a CNT/Sensus survey released on Monday.

The approval ratings of president's administration also rose, from 65.4 percent in September to 70 percent in November, despite the massive blackout of Nov. 10, which affected 18 Brazilian states for several hours.

These high approval ratings can also be attributed to Brazil's ongoing economic recovery and growth as well as to the positive economic outlook under Lula and his administration.

More:
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-11/24/content_12530165.htm

[Braulio]

1. Lula is a good leftist

Much more moderate than Chavez, Correa, and Castro, he is the one whose example should be followed. Also, notice he isn't trying to perpetuate himself in power, and will not be running for President in the next elections.

[Peace Patriot]

2. That's a Beltway "talking point," Braulio. "Good leftist" vs "bad leftist."

That's all they can do in the face of an historic leftist democracy revolution in Latin America--try to figure out how to "divide and conquer" it.

Lulu is having NONE OF IT. He, too, invited Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to South America, and EMBRACED him with smiles. The corpo-fascist press can no longer demonize Chavez and others for attending to the interests of THEIR countries, not those of the bullying, warmongering U.S., and making whatever alliances they damn please, on behalf of their own people and their region.

Lula da Silva has been a staunch, loyal, close friend and ally of Hugo Chavez and other leaders of the Bolivarian Revolution. They have common interests, common goals and common dreams. Lula has even taken up a critically important Bolivarian policy in Brazil, with regard to Brazil retaining sovereign control of its oil and using the profits to benefit the poor. As for Castro, Brazil and almost every other Latin American country oppose US policy on Cuba and have recognized Cuba's government as legitimate and as an equal. And many Latin American countries have recognized the benefits of Cuba's medical system and its literacy program--and are utilizing those good programs, and have welcomed Cuban experts in those fields, to help them address the same problems.

These are the things that the snide, cynical and probably desperate "Beltway" pundits and their corpo-fascist masters deliberately ignore. There is no "good left" and "bad left" in Latin America. There is an historic revolution to establish the independence of the entire region and to pull together in a European-style Common Market, with special focus on social justice and REAL democracy--grass roots democracy, democracy of the kind that, in previous eras in Latin America, often had to take up arms to defend itself against US-backed tyrants, but that now--after decades of hard work on democratic institutions--can peacefully elect REAL leaders and establishment governments "of, by and for the people."

You miss everything if you buy this crap about the "good left" and the "bad left."

[Judi Lynn]

4. Corporate media knew long ago if they attempted to attack ALL leftist leaders,

breathe down their necks every waking moment, reporting, trumpeting every time the leftist leaders hiccup, or have a bad hair day, they would make too many people suspicious, and NO ONE would read their crap.

Nothing could be clearer.

Once Chavez is gone, they will be after the next strong leftist. It's not as if it hasn't been this way for decades upon decades upon decades ALREADY! Grotesque.

Attempted perception molding. How "democratic." Dishonest as hell.

Any reasonably functional people can see this for what it is.

[Braulio]

7. Lula's a good leftist.

Chavez and Castro: Bad leftists. Both are autocrats who believe in marxist ideas. Lula, on the other hand, is pragmatic, and isn't about to get himself "re-elected" forever.

I am a good leftist too, I admire Lula. I think Chavez is incompetent.

[Peace Patriot]

8. 62% of Venezuelans don't think Chavez is incompetent.

He's maintained approval ratings in the 55% to 60% range virtually throughout his presidency and now higher than ever. Are you better informed, smarter and a better judge of the president's competence than the Venezuelan people in their collective opinion?

They've had a number of chances to throw him out, including a US-funded recall election, and have refused to do so, in numbers comparable to his approval ratings. I don't know about Cuba's election system (what vote counting method they use, or how candidates are nominated, except that everyone must stand for office as an individual, in Cuba, not as the rep of a political party, and even Communist parties members must stand for office on their own merits--which sounds like a pretty good idea to me), but Venezuela has the most transparent election system in the western hemisphere, on the face of it alone. I know about Venezuela's election system, in detail, and can cite chapter and verse. My interest in our own election system prompted me to look into Venezuela's. Now I know why Venezuelans have free medical care and free educations through college, and we don't. We have the LEAST transparent and LEAST fair election system in the western world--a cauldron of corruption, including 'TRADE SECRET' vote counting by a handful of rightwing corporations everywhere in the US. Venezuela's elections have furthermore been certified as honest, fair and transparent by all of the major election monitoring groups, including the Carter Center, and the EU and OAS election monitoring agencies.

Perhaps you think the people of Venezuela aren't well informed about Chavez. The news/opinion media in Venezuela is dominated by private rightwing corporations--several of whom supported the 2002 coup d'tat (which included suspension of the Constitution, the National Assembly, the courts all civil rights including freedom of speech). They criticize Chavez all the time, often viciously and unreasonably. So, if people want to hear the bad, they have abundant opportunity. He also has a weekly public call-in TV show on the government channel, in which he explains his policies. The government prints the Venezuelan Constitution on grocery bags. One of the Chavez government's first priorities is literacy and education. Venezuelans have plenty of information, and a president who actively promotes reading and learning, so that people can have access to a wide range of information and can make up their own minds about things. It's no wonder they vote for him in big numbers. He's a good president!

Please explain to me the difference between a strong leftist president, say FDR, and an "autocrat." FDR ran for and won four terms in office, and died in his fourth term. (He was president "forever.") What's wrong with the people voting for THEIR choice? The people approved of and voted for FDR every time he ran. They wanted and needed his leadership. How is this different from Chavez? The rightwing ALSO called FDR a "dictator." Was he? He tried to "pack the Supreme Court," didn't he? Well, guess why he did that? Because the holdover fascists from previous administrations were going to declare Social Security unconstitutional! By that threat--of increasing the number of justices, a perfectly legal thing for Congress to do--FDR saved Social Security, a program that is still providing elderly, retired workers with at least a minimal pension, which they have paid into throughout their working lives. The rightwing would deny us that. They want to "privatize" Social Security. Can you imagine what things would be like now if they had succeeded? We'd have millions of retired workers homeless and dying of starvation!

I think you are mistaking political strength and skill for tyranny.

Chavez has done absolutely nothing illegal. He has strictly adhered to the Constitution, and confined himself to powers granted to him by the Constitution or the legislature. He has harmed no one, and done much good. Why is it that the rightwing calls leftist leaders "dictators" when those leaders show strength in seeing to the interests of the poor majority, but when rightwing dictators like Bush come along, and do nothing that is not in the venal interests of the super-rich, and commit heinous atrocities such as killing hundreds of thousands of people and torturing prisoners, those rightwingers get very silent about "tyranny"?

[Braulio]

9. Chavez' approval rating is down

The latest polls show Chavez' popularity is down. But let's face it, the American public voted for Bush, and he was the worst president in US history. Chavez is a similar case, he's backed mostly by poor people who don't understand his performance is poor.

I believe a recent poll said more Venezuelans would vote for "anybody else" than for Chavez. And as I pointed out several times in the past, the Venezuelan economy is now predicted to be one of the worst performers in the world when 2009 and 2010 are combined. It's in bad shape, and forecasted to get worse. It's that nagging exchange rate problem I mentioned to you before, the lack of confidence by the business sector, the brain drain, and other issues which afflict a nation in transition towards Castro-like communism.

[Peace Patriot]

11. I wouldn't call 62% "down." What nonsense! And that's the latest approval rating.

I don't know why you are so negative on Venezuela. Chavez is NOT incompetent. Good Lord! He's been running Venezuela since 1998, with presidential elections in 1998, 2000, a recall election in 2004, and another presidential election in 2006, and has won every one of the them hands down, with increasing percentages of the vote--in an election system that is far, far more transparent, honest and aboveboard than our own. He has furthermore had approval ratings in the 60% range consistently over all that time, almost eleven years. He has overseen sizzling economic growth averaging 10% over the five year 2003 to 2008 period, with the most growth in the private sector, not including oil, WHILE funding massive literacy, education, medical, land reform and food and housing programs.

Venezuela ended the period with $43 billion in international cash reserves while the U.S. is BANKRUPT--indebted by trillions of dollars that will saddle our people for generations to come. In addition to its conservative money management, the Chavez government furthermore tightly regulated banks and finance, and was the first to shut down the Stanford ponzi scheme, and has cleaned up much of the scofflaw tax evasion in Venezuela. These strong central government policies of saving money, on the one hand, and spending money on the right things, on the other--investing in people--and keeping a tight reign on banksters have landed Venezuela on its feet, in the midst of the Bushwhacks' Financial 9/11--and Venezuela's influence has furthermore helped land other countries on their feet, notably Bolivia, which is also well positioned for quick recovery and growth.

Your explanation for why Chavez is so popular with voters is worthy of Ann Counter: "poor people don't understand (that) his performance is poor"!

Spare me your fascist insults of the poor! The poor understand markets better than anybody. If people have no money, there IS no market! Get it? Like HERE, where "neo-liberal" claptrap like yours has destroyed the most prosperous country on earth, and succeeded in destroying Latin American economies in the decade before Chavez and the Bolivarian Revolution.

They are now recovering--despite our downfall--because leftists like Chavez took over and led the rebellion against U.S. economic dictates.

And here's an excellent example of how that works:

"The bulk of Venezuela’s $43 billion international cash reserve has been deposited since 2005 with the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland — the central bank of the world’s central banks — rather than the big US private banks. As Chavez pointed out in February, 'If we hadn’t stopped trusting our international reserves to the big banks in the United States, a good part of those reserves would be lost.'”

http://directaction.org.au/issue10/venezuela_socialist_response_to_the_global_economic_crisis

[Judi Lynn]

5. Most bloated slimy corporatists don't have the character or strength or courage or goodness

to follow Lula's example, or that of any leftist attempting to bring hope to the victims of centuries of brutal oligarchic control of their countries.

Your side is doomed to lose, in time.

The Christian faith predicts it!

See "The Beatitudes."

[Judi Lynn]

3. Brazil's President Lula, 'Father of the Poor' Has Triggered Economic Miracle

Brazil's President Lula
'Father of the Poor' Has Triggered Economic Miracle
By Jens Glüsing



Brazil's President Lula visit the São Francisco river
which he plans to tap in a giant irrigation project.

Brazil is seen as an economic success story and its people revere President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva like a star. He is on a mission to turn the country into one of the world's five biggest economies through reforms, giant infrastructure projects and by tapping vast oil reserves. But he faces hurdles.

Elizete Piauí has been waiting patiently for hours in the shade of a mango tree. She is wearing plastic sandals and baggy shorts over her thin legs. At 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit), the air is shimmering on this unusually hot day in Barra, a small city in the Sertão, the heart of northeastern Brazil. But Piauí isn't complaining, because today is her big day, the day she meets the president, who is working to provide her hut with running water.

The rattle of a helicopter signals his arrival. The white aircraft circles once over the crowd before landing. A motorcycle escort accompanies the Brazilian president to the ceremony.

Lula gets out of the limousine wearing a white linen shirt and a green military hat. Ignoring the local dignitaries in their dark suits, Lula heads straight for the crowd behind a security barrier. "Lula, Papai! (Papa Lula!)" Elizete calls out. He pulls her to his chest and shakes the hands of others in the crowd, allowing them to touch, stroke and embrace him. Beads of sweat are running down his flushed face, and people are tugging at his shirt, but Lula soaks in the attention. He feels at home here, in one of Brazil's poorest regions.

The president spends three days traveling through the Sertão. He knows the route. He came to the region 15 years ago for the first time on a campaign tour, traveling by bus and staying in inexpensive guesthouses. He made stops in every village square, seven or eight times a day, and usually held his speeches from the back of a truck. His voice was usually hoarse and weak by the evening, and he had to change his sweat-soaked shirt up to 10 times a day.

"He is Still One of us"

Now he travels in helicopters and armored cars, while police cars, their blue lights flashing, lead the way along country roads. Volunteers have set up air-conditioners and buffet meals at Lula's lodgings, and sometimes they even roll out a red carpet. The press criticizes the expense, but it doesn't trouble most Brazilians because they're proud of their president. He has made it to the top, they argue, so why shouldn't he enjoy his success? "He is still one of us," says Elizete, "because he is the father of the poor."

Lula is familiar with the fate of the Nordestinos, as the people in Brazil's poor Northeast Region are called. He was born in the Sertão, but his mother eventually put the children on the back of a truck and took them to São Paulo, 2,000 kilometers to the south. Lula's eventual rise to power began in São Paulo's industrial suburbs. His mother was one of the hundreds of thousands of have-nots who left the drought-plagued Sertão with its dried-up fields and livestock dying of thirst, and migrated to the wealthy south to work as doormen, waiters, construction workers or domestic servants.

More:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,662917,00.html

[Braulio]

10. I really like Lula

But you'll notice he's not pushing the same policies Chavez is. Nor does he swoon histerically when Colombia signs a treaty with the US.

[Peace Patriot]

12. Lulu damn well IS pushing the same policies Chavez is!

1. He adopted a Chavez policy of sovereign control over oil reserves recently, insisting that the bulk of the shares in Brazil's big new oil discovery will be owned by the Brazilian people and the profits used for their benefit. That is exactly the point on which Chavez and Exxon Mobil clashed several years ago. Now Lulu is doing it--asserting national control over the oil.

2. He shares Chavez's political philosophy of "raising all boats"--that is, NOT lording it over smaller, poorer countries, and exploiting them--as the U.S. does--but rather HELPING them, for instance, Lulu pressured Brazilian companies to agree to renegotiate Paraguay's hydroelectric contracts, which were very unfair to Paraguay, and is helping to finance a new highway from Brazil's Atlantic coast, to the Pacific, through Bolivia, which, combined with Chile settling a 100 year old dispute and granting Bolivia access to the sea, will turn Bolivia into a major trade route for the Global South. Lulu did not have to do these things, just as Chavez did not have help bail Argentina and Bolivia out of ruinous World Bank/IMF debt, or provide cheap oil to the ALBA countries. Both leaders are operating from a higher consciousness which precludes bullying and requires cooperation, to raise the prospects of the entire region. This is a shared philosophy which they meet and discuss every month.

3. He shares Chavez's pioneering view on the economic/political integration of Latin American countries, and recently stated, in the context of a public event with Chavez, announcing several new Venezuela/Brazilian economic ventures, that "we must look to each other and not to the north" for economic stability, prosperity and social justice.

4. Lulu recently welcomed Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, president of Iran, to Brazil, as Chavez had done in Venezuela--despite U.S. demonization of Iran and of Ahmadinejad in particular--in strong assertion of their countries' right to make agreements that are in the interest of their peoples, no matter what the U.S. thinks about it. They have a sovereign right to make their own judgements about alliances, and to refuse the dictates of the arrogant bully to the north.

-----

As for, "Nor does (Lulu) swoon histerically when Colombia signs a treaty with the US," what about Lulu's statement that US 4th Fleet, newly reconstituted in Caribbean, is "a threat to Brazil's oil reserves," and his proposal of a "common defense" in South America, which was adopted by UNASUR, the new South American "common market" last year? Lulu is as concerned about security as Chavez is, and he knows that Latin America has only one threat: the U.S.

You've been reading too much Washington Psst and Wall Street Urinal psyops about "the good left" and "the bad left." That's THEIR idea. It is not Lulu's and Chavez's idea, nor that of the many other leftist leaders of the region. These countries have variations in culture, in political landscape, in leadership style and in the details of some of the policies they pursue, but they are so unified on common goals of sovereignty, independence and social justice, that you would have to be blind not to see it. This notion that Lulu and Chavez are somehow at odds is a complete fabrication of our corpo-fascist media, who are engaging in wish fulfillment and the writing of false narratives to please their corporate masters and propagandize the rest of us.

[Braulio]

13. Sorry, but that's not the way it is

Lula and Chavez follow quite different economic policies. Lula's is characterized by a pro-capitalist stance, his diplomacy is aimed at getting business for Brazilian private corporations. In Brazil, there's no fear of arbitrary nationalization as we see in Venezuela.

Regarding the oil, in Brazil private companies are allowed to operate projects. It is true Petrobras has the bulk of the production - but Petrobras itself has been partially privatized. Petrobras is a very efficient oil company, recognized for its deep water and biofuels expertise. Meanwhile, PDVSA has been lobotomized. It's joint ventures are not functioning well, the sole risk ventures (in which PDVSA has no partners) are doing even worse. And Chavez is nationalizing the service sector to avoid paying debts. In conclusion, the Venezuelan oil industry is a DISASTER, and it has nothing to do with Brazil's.

[Judi Lynn]

6. Brazil-related Nat'l Geographic prgram next Sunday:

Nazi Mystery: Blonde Twins from Brazil on National Geographic this week
Smallscreen News
By April MacIntyre Nov 24, 2009, 16:52 GMT

National Geographic exposes the real life Nazi mystery of Dr. Joseph Mengele in Exploer: Nazi Mystery: Twins from Brazil this Sunday, November 29.

Explorer airs this Sunday, November 29 at 9PM ET/PT

Joseph Mengele, the escaped Nazi war criminal and SS physician, known as the Angel of Death, spent years doing cruel, gruesome and inhuman medical experiments on twins at Auschwitz working to determine if twins held the key to building a blond-haired, blue-eyed master race for Adolf Hitler.

There is real evidence that Mengele's attempts may not have ended at Auschwitz, and that his obsession to engineer an Aryan master race continued, and that succeeded while he was on the run in South America.

Deep in the Brazilian outback in a tiny town among the 80 households in a one-square-mile area are reportedly some 38 pairs of twins.

Blond, blue-eyed twins. Bizarre and inexplicable, could they be the product of Mengele's machinations?

Now, with exclusive access, EXPLORER goes inside the investigation; From the secret agents who trailed him, to the scientists now uncovering the facts behind the fantastical phenomenon, no stone is left unturned.

Video “A Town Full of Twins” –

Seeing double is normal in Cândido Godói, Brazil, where the rate of twin births is nearly a thousand percent above the global average.

One theory is that the Nazi doctor, Josef Mengele, may be behind the phenomenon.

Read more: http://www.monstersandcritics.com/smallscreen/news/article_1515233.php/Nazi-Mystery-Blonde-Twins-from-Brazil-on-National-Geographic-this-week#ixzz0XnrQngNp